Ireland in July 1783, but they soon after abandoned it: at this period many Genevan families settled in England. Another revolution, July 1794. Geneva was admitted by the diet into the Swiss Confederation, in 1813. GENOA. Its ancient inhabitants were the Ligures, who submitted to the Romans, 115 B. C., and underwent the revolutions of the Roman empire till A. D. 950. The Genoese revolt against their count, choose a doge and other magistrates from among their nobility, and become an aristocratic Republic, 1030 to 1034. Several revolutions occurred up to 1528, when the celebrated Andrew Doria rescued his country from the dominion of foreign powers. Bombarded by the French in 1684, and by the British in 1688 and 1745. Genoa was taken by the Imperialists, Dec. 8, 1746; but their oppression of the people was such, that the latter suddenly rose, and expelled their conquerors, who again besieged the city the next year, August 17, without effect. Genoa lost Corsica 1730. The celebrated bank failed 1750. The city sustained a siege by a British fleet and Austrian army, until literally starved, and was evacuated by capitulation, May 1800; but it was surrendered to the French soon after their victory at Marengo. The Ligurian Republic was founded upon that of Genoa, in 1801, and the doge solemnly invested, August 10, 1802. Genoa annexed to the French empire, May 25, 1805. It surrendered to the combined English and Sicilian army, April 18, 1814; and was transferred to the king of Sardinia in 1816. Insurrection against Victor Emmanuel, April 1; subdued April 11, 1849.

GENTLEMEN. The Gauls observing that, during the empire of the Romans, the Scutarii and Gentiles had the best appointments of all the soldiers, applied to them the terms écuyers and gentilshommes. This distinction of gentleman was much in use in England, and was given to the well descended, about A. D. 1430.-Sidney.

GEOGRAPHY. The first correct record we have of geographical knowledge is from Homer. He describes the shield of Achilles as representing the earth, surrounded by the sea.-Iliad. He accurately describes the countries of Greece, islands of the Archipelago, and site of Troy. The priests taught that the temple of Apollo at Delphos was the centre of the world. Anaximander of Miletus was the inventor of geographical maps, about 568 B. C. Hipparchus attempted to reduce geography to mathematical bases, about 135 B. c. It was first brought to Europe by the Moors of Barbary and Spain, about A. D. 1201.-Lenglet. The invention of the mariner's compass is the important connecting link between ancient and modern geography. The modern maps and charts were introduced into England by Bartholomew Columbus to illustrate his brother's theory respecting a western continent, A. D. 1489.

GEOLOGY. The science of the earth has been the subject of philosophical speculation from the time of Homer; and this science is said to have been cultivated in China many ages before the Christian era. When the theories and discoveries of geologists were first propounded, they were condemned as being opposed to the statements of the Bible; but in this enlightened age the astronomer and geologist, in proportion as their minds are expanded by scientific investigation, see that there is no collision between the discoveries in the natural world, and the inspired record. We are not called upon by Scripture to admit, neither are we required to deny, the supposition that the matter without form and void, out of which this globe of earth was framed, may have consisted of the wrecks and relics of more ancient worlds, created and destroyed by the same Almighty power which called our world into being, and will one day cause it to pass away. Thus while the Bible reveals to us the moral history and destiny of our race, and teaches us that man and other living things have been placed but a few thousand years

upon the earth, the physical monuments of our globe bear witness to the same truth; and as astronomy unfolds to us myriads of worlds, not spoken of in the sacred records, geology in like manner proves, not by arguments drawn from analogy, but by the incontrovertible evidence of physical phenomena, that there were former conditions of our planet, separated from each other by vast intervals of time, during which this world was teeming with life, ere man, and the animals which are his contemporaries, had been called into being.-Dr. Mantell and Bishop Blomfield.

GEOMETRY. Its origin is ascribed to the Egyptians; the annual inundations of the Nile having given rise to it by carrying away the landmarks, and the boundaries of farms. Thales introduced geometry into Greece about 600 B. C. Euclid's Elements were compiled about 280 B. C. The doctrine of curves originally attracted the attention of geometricians from the conic sections, which were introduced by Plato about 390 E. c. The conchoid curve was invented by Nicomedes, 220 B. c. The science of geometry was taught in Europe in the thirteenth century. Books on the subject of geometry and astronomy were destroyed in England, being regarded as infected with magic, 7 Edward VI., 1552.-Stowe. GEORGES' CONSPIRACY. The memorable conspiracy in France; general Moreau, general Pichegru, Georges Cadoudal, who was commonly known by the name of Georges, and others, arrested at Paris, charged with a conspiracy against the life of Bonaparte, and for the restoration of Louis XVIII, Feb. 23, 1804. The conspirators were tried June 9, when seventeen were sentenced to death, and many to imprisonment. Moreau was suffered to leave France, and was escorted from the temple to embark for America, June 22. In 1813 he received his mortal wound before Dresden, which see. GEORGIA, one of the United States, was granted by George II. to Gen. Oglethorpe, who, with forty followers, founded Savannah, Feb. 1, 1733. Savannah taken by the British in the revolutionary war, Dec. 29, 1778; the town and State evacuated by them in July 1782. The State unanimously adopted the Federal Constitution, Jan. 2, 1788. Population in 1790, 82,584; in 1840, 691,392, including 280,944 slaves. Staple commodities, cotton and rice. GERMANIC CONFDERATION. Napoleon had determined that the German, or Holy Roman Empire, as it was called, should no longer exist; but that instead thereof, a confederation of states should be formed; and this arrangement was adopted in 1815, by the allied sovereigns; and Germany is now governed by a diet, consisting of seventeen voices, and in case any alteration be requisite in the constitution, they are then to take a new division, and the general assembly then to be formed is to contain sixty-five, divided according to the relative consequence of the states.

GERMANY. From Germanni, warlike men. First mentioned by the Roman historians about 211 B. C.: it was anciently divided into several independent states until 25 B. C., when the Germans withstood the attempt of the Romans to subdue them, although they conquered some parts; but by the repeated efforts of the Germans they were entirely expelled, about A. D. 290. În 432, the Huns, driven from China, conquered the greatest part of this extensive country; but it was not totally subdued till Charlemange, the first emperor, became master of the whole, A. D. 802.

There are about 20 German principalities with territories equal to English counties. The free towns are Hamburg, Bremen, Frankfort on the Maine (one of the greatest trading places in Europe), and Lubeck, which was the head of the famous Hanseatic League, formed in that city in 1164. GHENT. Anciently the capital of the Nervii. Prince John, third son of Edward III. of England, was born here, and hence named John of Gaunt. Pacification of Ghent, November 8, 1576. Ghent was taken by the duke of Marlborough in A. D. 1706, and several times taken and retaken by the contending armies during the late wars. The peace of Ghent between Great Britain and the United States, was signed here, December 24, 1814. GIANTS. The emperor Maximus was eight feet and a half in height; he was also of great bulk, and used the bracelet of his wife as a ring for his thumb, and his shoe was longer by a foot than that of an ordinary man.-Zuinglius. "The tallest man that hath been seen in our age was one named Gabara, who in the days of Claudius the late emperor was brought out of Arabia. He was nine feet nine inches high."-Pliny. John Middleton, of Hale, in Lancashire, born in 1578, was nine feet three inches high. Patrick Cotter, the celebrated Irish giant, born in 1761, was eight feet seven inches in height; his hand, from the commencement of the palm to the extremity of the middle finger, measured twelve inches, and his shoe was seventeen inches long; he died in September 1806, in his 46th year. Giants' bones 17, 18, 20, and 30 feet high, were once reported to have been found; but there is now no doubt that they were organic remains of colossal quadrupeds. GIBRALTAR. A fortress, whose immense strength excites wonder and admiration, and renders it impregnable: it is the ancient Calpe, which, with Abyla on the opposite shore of Africa, obtained the name of the Pillars of Hercules. The height of the rock, according to Cuvier, is 1437 English feet: it was taken by the Saracens under Tarik (Gibel-Tarik, Mountain of Tarik, whence its present name) in A. D. 712. In the year 1462 the king of Castile took Gibraltar from the Moors; and the English, under sir George Rooke, the prince of Hesse Darmstadt, sir John Leake, and admiral Byng, bravely won it, July 24, 1704. It was surrendered, after a dreadful cannonade, to the British, by the governor, the marquis de Salines; and it has since continued an appendage to the British crown.

The army amounted to 40,000 men. The duke of Crillon commanded 12,000 of the best troops of France. 1000 pieces of artillery were brought to bear against the fortress, besides which, there

GILDING. First practised at Rome, about 145 B. C. The capitol was the first building on which this enrichment was bestowed.-Pliny. Of gold leaf for gilding the Romans made but 750 leaves, four fingers square, out of a whole ounce.-Pliny. It consequently was more like our plating.-Trusler. A single grain of gold may now be stretched out under the hammer into a leaf that will cover a house.-Dr. Halley. Gilding with leaf gold on bole ammoniac was first introduced by Margaritone, in 1273. The art of gilding on wood, previously known, was improved in 1680.

GISORS, BATTLE OF, in France, between the armies of France and England, in which the former was signally defeated by Richard I., whose parole for the day was "Dieu et mon droit"—"God and my right;" and from this time it was made the motto to the royal arms of England, A. D. 1198.

GLADIATORS. They were originally malefactors who fought for their lives, or captives who fought for their freedom. They exhibited at the funeral ceremonies of the Romans, 263 B. C., probably following the Greek custom of sacrificing to the manes of deceased warriors the prisoners taken in battle. Gladiator fights afterwards exhibited at festivals, about 215 B. C. When Dacia was reduced by Trajan, 1000 gladiators fought at Rome in celebration of his triumph for 123 days, A. D. 103. Their combats on public theatres were suppressed in the East by Constantine the Great, A. D. 325. Finally suppressed by Theodorick, in the year 500.-Lenglet.

GLASGOW. Erected into a burgh in A. D. 1180. Its charter was obtained from James II., in 1451, at which period the university was founded. Its earliest commerce was in salmon, about 1420.

GLASS. The Egyptians are said to have been taught the art of making glass by Hermes. The discovery of glass took place in Syria.-Pliny. Glasshouses were erected in Tyre, where glass was a staple manufacture for many ages. This article is mentioned among the Romans in the time of Tiberius; and we know, from the ruins of Pompeii, that windows were formed of glass before A. D. 79. Italy had the first glass windows, next France, whence they came to England. Used for windows in private houses in the reign of Henry II., 1177, but imported.-Anderson. The manufacture was established in England at Crutched-friars, and in the Savoy, in 1557.Stowe. It was improved in 1635, and was brought to great perfection in the reign of William III. The duties on glass in England were entirely remitted, 1845.

GLASS, PAINTING ON. This was a very early art. "It was practised at Marseilles in a beautiful style, about A. D. 1500. It is said the art existed in England towards the 12th century. It reached to a state of great perfection about 1530. GLENCOE, MASSACRE OF. This was the horrible massacre of the unoffending and unsuspecting inhabitants, the Macdonalds, merely for not surrendering in time to king William's proclamation. About 38 men were brutally slain; and women and children, their wives and offspring, were turned out naked

were 47 sail of the line, all three-deckers; 10 great floating batteries, esteemed invincible, carrying 212 guns; innumerable frigates, xebeques, bomb-ketches, cutters, and gun and mortar boats; while small craft for disembarking the forces covered the bay. For weeks together, 6000 shells were daily thrown into the town; and on a single occasion, 8000 barrels of gunpowder were expended by the enemy. Yet in one night, their floating batteries were destroyed with red-hot balls, and their whole line of works annihilated by a sortie from the garrison, commanded by general Elliot, Nov. 27, 1781. The enemy's loss in munitions of war, on this night alone, was estimated at upwards of 2,600,000l. sterling. But their grand defeat by a garrison of only 7000 British, occurred Sept. 13, 1782.